, and you can
fall and break your own head into the bargain."

_Tale_ 13.--The Khoja's Quilt.

One night after Khoja Nasr-ed-Deen had retired to rest he was disturbed
by a man making a great noise before his door in the street outside.

"O wife!" said he, "get up, I pray you, and light a candle, that I may
discover what this noise in the street is about."

"Lie still, man," said his wife. "What have we to do with street
brawlers? Keep quiet and go to sleep."

But the Khoja would not listen to her advice, and taking the bed-quilt,
he threw it round his shoulders, and went out to see what was the
matter.

Then the rascal who was making the disturbance, seeing a fine quilt
floating from the Khoja's shoulders, came behind him and snatched it
away, and ran off with it.

After a while the Khoja felt thoroughly chilled, and he went back to
bed.

"Well, Effendi," said his wife: "what have you discovered?"

"We were more concerned in the noise than you thought," said the Khoja.

"What was it about, O Khoja?" asked his wife.

"It must have been about our quilt," he replied; "for when the man got
that he went off quietly enough."

_Tale_ 14.--The Khoja and the Beggar.

One day whilst Nasr-ed-Deen Effendi was in his house, a man knocked at
the door.

The Khoja looked out from an upper window.

"What dost thou want?" said he. But the man was a beggar by trade, and
fearing that the Khoja might refuse to give alms when he was so well
beyond reach of the mendicant's importunities, he would not state his
business, but continued to cry, "Come down, come down!" as if he had
something of importance to relate.

So the Khoja went down, and on his again saying "What dost thou
want?" the beggar began to beg, crying, "The Inciter of Compassion move
thee to enable me to purchase food for my supper! I am the guest of the
Prophet!" with other exclamations of a like nature.

"Come up-stairs," replied the Khoja, turning back into his house.

Well pleased, the beggar followed him, but when they reached the upper
room the Khoja turned round and dismissed him, saying, "Heaven supply
your necessities. I have nothing for you."

"O Effendi!" said the beggar, "why did you not tell me this whilst I was
below?"

"O Beggar!" replied the Khoja, "why did you call me down when I was
up-stairs?"

_Tale_ 15.--The Khoja Turned Nightingale.

One day the Khoja went into a garden which did not belong to him, and
seeing an apricot-tr